{"id":2074,"date":"2016-04-28T08:00:49","date_gmt":"2016-04-28T12:00:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sakanashiandassociates.com\/blog\/?p=2074"},"modified":"2016-05-04T20:26:12","modified_gmt":"2016-05-05T00:26:12","slug":"thoughtful-thursdays-speak-the-language-your-customer-understands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sakanashiandassociates.com\/blog\/2016\/04\/28\/thoughtful-thursdays-speak-the-language-your-customer-understands\/","title":{"rendered":"Thoughtful Thursdays &#8211; Speak the language your customer understands"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>One way to shorten your sales cycle is to minimize\u00a0the back an forth that takes place between you and your prospect during the sales process.<\/p>\n<p>The back and forth I am referring to comes into play when expectations are unclear and either you and\/or your customer have to go back and check or confirm information. It\u00a0often happens when assumptions are made.<\/p>\n<p>Having a clear understanding of expectations, wants and needs requires stakeholders to speak the same language. The classic Abbott and Costello <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=kTcRRaXV-fg\">&#8220;Who&#8217;s on first&#8221;<\/a> skit\u00a0is a great demonstration of two people not speaking the same language. Getting the answer to a simple question has never been more difficult.<\/p>\n<p>Okay, that was a bit of a stretch. Here are a few ways you can speak the same language as your prospect and minimize the back and forth.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Set objectives for all sales calls<\/li>\n<li>Prepare questions in advance that will help achieve the objectives<\/li>\n<li>If possible, know your audience and choose your approach<\/li>\n<li>Be prepared to adjust your approach for different personalities<\/li>\n<li>Confirm your findings with your prospect\u00a0as part of\u00a0every\u00a0call you make<\/li>\n<li>Assume nothing<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Paying attention to these details will help minimize the back and forth resulting in a shorter sales cycle.<\/p>\n<p>Good selling,<br \/>\nRichard<\/p>\n<p>Have a question about sales? <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sakanashiandassociates.com\/contact\" target=\"_blank\">Contact Sakanashi and Associates Inc.<\/a> and I will respond.<\/p>\n<p>Please share Thoughtful Thursdays posts with people you feel may find the topic interesting and helpful<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One way to shorten your sales cycle is to minimize\u00a0the back an forth that takes place between you and your prospect during the sales process. The back and forth I am referring to comes into&#8230; <a href=\"https:\/\/sakanashiandassociates.com\/blog\/2016\/04\/28\/thoughtful-thursdays-speak-the-language-your-customer-understands\/\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,5,34,3,1],"tags":[60,35,36,73],"class_list":["post-2074","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sales","category-sales-tips","category-things-that-can-shorten-the-sales-cycle","category-thoughtful-thursdays","category-uncategorized","tag-sales-2","tag-sales-tips-2","tag-shorten-sales-cycle","tag-thoughtful-thursdays"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sakanashiandassociates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sakanashiandassociates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sakanashiandassociates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sakanashiandassociates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sakanashiandassociates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2074"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/sakanashiandassociates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2074\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2087,"href":"https:\/\/sakanashiandassociates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2074\/revisions\/2087"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sakanashiandassociates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sakanashiandassociates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sakanashiandassociates.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}